


sacrifice, sacrament

by peachyteabuck



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, F/F, Inspired by Hades and Persephone (Hellenistic Religion & Lore), Lesbian Sex, Marriage of Convenience
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-06
Updated: 2019-03-06
Packaged: 2019-11-12 15:00:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,521
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18013076
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/peachyteabuck/pseuds/peachyteabuck
Summary: "we only know of one duty, and that is to love" – albert camustouches between tender lovers, unburdened by mortality or a world beyond their own





	sacrifice, sacrament

**Author's Note:**

> 2019 writing goal met: hades and persephone au  
> plus this fic pushes me past 100k words on my tumblr!

 

_Marriages are usually a time for fan fair, feasting, festivities. The uniting of two souls is not something the mortals take lightly, each celebration grander than the last as more and more people are brought together in an eternal union._

_You tried to remember this as you’re passed off to the woman in front of you. The ghost of fried desserts and large plots of meat coat your nostrils, a small reminder of home and the life you so valiantly decided to leave behind. Phantom pains from the screams of joy from little children and your cheeks from smiling too much plant themselves in your muscles and skin, and as you step closer and closer to the altar. When your bare feet meet her shoed ones, you realized how much you truly didn’t know about your new life._

If they did not link their love into the earth, where would it go? _You wondered._ Would she wear shoes when you consummated the tie as well?

_Vows are exchanged as smoothly as a rusted sword enters well-made armor. You choked up quickly, the occasional tear smearing the make-up you had been requested to wear. Right before the “I do”s your almost-betrothed wipes one out of the corner for your eye. She didn’t smile when you look up at her chocolate brown eyes, but she did squeeze your left hand. It was enough. Not much, but enough._

“Baby,” Valkyrie speaks lowly, her lips brushing against the bare skin of your shoulder. “Come back to me.”

You don’t pull away, one arm across your chest to fiddle with your necklace and the other at your side, the soft sheets bunched up in your hand. “I never left you, my love.”

_The only witness was the mother, who was a thousand times more excited at the nuptials than her daughter._

_Soon after the priest finishds the rituals traditional to the wedding of gods he sent the newly-weds away, escorted by a few of the she-wolves that guard the entrance to the Underworld._

Valkyrie’s dressed, ready to start her day of judgement. The black suit is impeccable, fitting her perfectly with the matching matte tie, shirt, and shoes. “Mmm,” she pushes aside the soft, thin fabric of your nightgown to kiss further down your back. “I disagree, my love. What are you thinking about?”

“The day we wed,” you reply honestly. “How terrified I was of the life after I would become yours.”

Valkyrie doesn’t reply, and her touches have stopped. She remembers that day as vividly as you do, despite her contrasting emotions. Where you were terrified to your very core, she felt nothing but disdain. Law had it that she had to be married to someone within the first year of her crowning, and by “luck” your mother had offered you up during the social season that corresponded with the last few months of Valkyrie’s disgruntled search.

_“I thought they were vicious beasts,” you mumbled. One of the large creatures sees your twitching fingers, and begrudgingly allowed you to pet their large, fleecy ears._

_“Only to those who have not been allowed to enter,” Valkyrie said back with voice flat as a well-made kitchen table and just as smooth. As you enter the bottomless cave, there’s an indescribable darkness that makes your hands tense around your betrothed’s hand. “Are you scared?” She asked, still not looking your way._

_“I-I…” You swallowed as something scaly brushed past your bare feet. “Yes.”  
“Well,” Val grumbles. “Welcome to your new home.”_

The woman had intended on ruling the Underworld alone, spending eternity in sweet solitude with her cows and Cerberus. But not even she could defy the law of the gods, despite her stubborn ways.

The once-blank ceiling above the bed is now covered in deep green vines with minds of their own. As you still and tears well up in yours eyes, they reach down to curl around your limbs and wipe at the wet trails on your cheeks. The warmth from their leaves is calming, and you pet at the main stem as a small _thank you_.

“You know,” you can feel your wife smiling as she talks. “I still find it offensive that they don’t ever do that for me.”

You curl into her, tracing the stitching in the suit. The thick, woolen material scratches at the skin where Val’s pulled your dress has been pulled down. It’s an itch you welcome, rubbing into it while you cuddle into her chest. Valkyrie always runs cold, her olive skin always chilled when you’ve twisted your legs with hers or held her hand or, in the beginning, accidently brushed against her body as you shared Val’s large bed.

_The marriage went unconsummated for months…four, to be exact. For the first week you hid in a greenhouse that had been abandoned long ago, tending to the expiring plants. You didn’t allow Val to touch you, you didn’t allow her to see you._

_She knew what you felt, exactly what you felt. You were an abused puppy that had been dumped in a card box in the rain after pissing on the carpet. You weren’t mad at Valkyrie, you were_ petrified _of her, of your new life, of your new home._

Somehow, you’re able to unbutton the first few buttons on her shirt and press your hands between her braless breasts. Val looks down at you, glaring at your innocent smile and contented face.

“Your fingers are so hot, love,” she whispers playfully. “Every time you touch me I think you’re going to burn me.”

You turn to face her, slipping more buttons back through their slits. Coyly, you lock eyes as you push off her scratchy jacket. “Is that a bad thing?”

Val smirks, untying the loose night gown you were to let it fall down your bare shoulders. The skin just below your collarbones is peppered with dark purple bruises from your escapades the night before, similar coloring smattered across your chest, inner thighs and waist. She reaches out to touch one, the tough skin of her fingertips touching the sensitive skin there. “ _Mm_ ,” she hums thoughtfully as you both sit, facing each other topless. “Oh, of course not, wife, I love your calescence” she crawls over you, pushing the rest of your dress off. You get the message quickly, moving to undo her belt and zipper. “Love it when your fire stings me, when I dip my fingers into your heat and I think you’re going to set my arm ablaze. Love it when my lips drag across your skin and it feels like you’re going to incinerate them.”

You whimper as she finally removes the last of her clothing, leaving both of you naked as Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden (or, you think that’s how the Christians tell it). Each time your skin meets you think there’s going to be smoke, be marks scorched across both of yours’ bodies; the touch renders you speechless.

_The first time Valkyrie lured you out was with a small Highland calf that had been sacrificed but cast aside by the rest of the “better,” more “worthy” gods an account of its missing back left leg. You stepped out of the greenhouse, hands up to your elbows and feet to your calves caked in deep, rich soil._

_The small animal immediately limps over to you, happy noises leaving its mouth as you pet its hairy belly._

_“What is her name?” You ask, looking to Valkyrie as if you were a child expecting their mother to take away their toy at any second._

_“She doesn’t have one,” she said truthfully._

_You furrow your brows thoughtfully for a second as you stare at the creature before widening to excitement. “We should call her Ludic!”  
Val’s brain stops as she watches you play with the three-legged creature. _We, _she thought_. What do you mean “we”?

_Nonetheless, after that day, you and Val became closer and closer as the cow grew_.

You gasp as Valkyrie kisses down your navel before stopping right before your center. “You evoke such feeling of a fire in the middle of snowstorm, my love,” she tells you, her flattened tongue licking from the bottom of your slit to your sensitive nub. She ignores your high-pitched whines, ignores your begs as she sinks one, two fingers into you. “Make me want to curl beside you and fuck you with fervor.”

You cry as she leaves slow licks around her fingers, which remain annoyingly stagnant inside of you. As you try to fuck yourself down onto them, her unoccupied hand presses into your hips.

“Don’t move, love,” she whispers into your inner thigh. “I’ll take care of you, let me take care of you.”

Your head is flush against the pillow, your wild hair splayed across the black, silken pillows. Val loves seeing you like this, all vulnerable and glowing and desperate for the God of the Underworld to bring her unnamable pleasures. Your mouth hangs open as you gasp at each slight _curl_ of her fingers or _press_ of her tongue. This woman, this _deity_ has you at her very whim. You would walk into the River Styx if she asked you, you’d trust she’d keep you safe as you stepped into the smoking green sludge.

Your orgasm is intense, each muscle contradiction a storm, a thunder cloud wherein each breath makes more electricity spark across your skin. Valkyrie coos as your body convulses violently, her sweet _sh_ s and light kisses bringing you down from your sweet high.

_Something changed after you had named the cow; Valkyrie had your world turn upside down when she chose you as her wife, and it seems in beautiful revenge she had flipped yours as well. While you still loved to spend times in the greenhouse, you began to invite Val into your room at night when she would ask if you needed anything before bed, if you were comfortable, if you needed water._

_She had come to expect that you would shake your head and turn over, but that night you simply pulled back the thick covers as a wordless welcome._

_Val walked forward slowly, as not to scare a wild doe in the thick of her forest. “Are…are you sure, love?”_

_You just nodded, waiting for her to join you before curling yourself into her arms. She seemed tentative, worried any sudden movements would scare you off. You were relaxed though, and after months of sleeping so devastatingly alone, you fell asleep quickly in the arms of the woman you had married._

“Please, _more_ ,” you cried when she pulled off you. “Please, my god my _king_ please give me more.”

You can feel Valkyrie’s smile as she kisses at your stained neck. “Of course, my queen. You know I will always grant you whatever you wish.”

In an instant she has your legs spread open with one thrown over her shoulder and the other pressed flat onto the disrupted sheets. With both hands pressed onto your chest, she begins to rock her heat against yours in long, fluid motions.

Soon you’re both throwing your heads back in pleasure as sounds of slick begins echoing in your shared room. You try and touch Val, try and trail you hands up her torso to draw her closer.

“Nuh-uh, my love,” she coos like before. For a moment you don’t understand, don’t understand why she’s stopped touching you until you feel her remove her own hands from your chest. She links your fingers together before pushing yours into each side of the pillow next to your head, the action giving her every type of leverage. All you can do is turn your head and kiss at her wrists, mind blank apart from the pleasure your wife brings you.

“I love you,” is all you can muster. “I love you I love you I love you.”

For a moment, Valkyrie slows as she tries to find the words to reply. Valkyrie, God and King of the Underworld, is not one for off-the-cuff professions of feelings, of _intimacy_. With you, though, she feels like impulsiveness is always a bad thing. Maybe spontaneity isn’t something to fear, maybe your happiness grounded in playfulness isn’t childless or something to fear.

So, Valkyrie speaks, _oh_ does she speak.

“Gods, I love you more than Icarus loves the sun, I love you more than the mortals love to pray to Zeus, I love you more than you love that stupid cow. I love you more than I love this realm, I love you more than I love black coffee,” her ruts speed up as she professes. “I would lock Apollo up in a world of water if you wanted the sun, I would drink the oceans if you wanted to walk on their floors. There is nothing, _oh-_ “Val’s head falls as she nears her own orgasm. “ _Oh,_ there’s nothing you don’t deserve, my love, and nothing I wouldn’t do to make you deserve it.”

Any further sounds from either of your mouths are loud gasps and choked cries as you both meet your peak. As Val collapses next to you she slows, wide smile plastered across her face.

Breathless, you’re the first to utter comprehensible words.

“Do you love me that much?” you mutter in the sunlight room. Val turns over and peppers kisses all over your face, making you giggle and try and pushing her away.

As she succeeds, she leaves one final peck over your left eyebrow. “Does that prove it?”

_You two continued like that, cuddling in one another’s beds at any time possible. Each time you both became more and more adventurous with the other’s bodies. First it was the meeting of skin – not laying on the other side of the bed as you slept.  Then came the brushing of fingertips, the lips meeting lips, the lips meeting skin, the lips meeting lips again._

_You’d had…experiences…from your time on the face of the Earth. Cute little experiences with farm girls in wide fields hidden by tall grass and blossoming crops. They’d never been as awe-inspiring as your times with Valkyrie though, never been as toe-curling or jaw-dropping or leg-kicking as the early morning and late afternoon and mid-night testimonies to each other’s bodies._

_There were other professions of passion, though, like when you left Val flowers on her desk or when she unties your dresses at the end of a hard gardening day._

_But the love-making always topped all of that, was always the best way for both of you to express your devotion. No matter how frantic or tender, whether your wife is conquering your body or putting it back together. The electricity between you always seemed to be your greatest treasure._

For a moment you faux-consider, _hmm_ ing and tapping your chin. Val fakes the offensive she takes, gasping and hitting your shoulder.

“Really? Are you going to do that?” she cries.

You shrug. “Yes.”

Val’s eyes narrow. “Yes to hesitating, or yes to the proof.”

Your smile is bright as you speak. “ _Both_.”


End file.
